“Oh, of course not, only after all, it couldn’t have hurt us, and might have saved the poor midget some heartaches. She was desperately in love with us both, don’t you know--it must have been for our good looks, not our amiability! I think that a kind word or smile from us would have made her perfectly happy. I am haunted especially by one incident: The midget approached us with her chubby little fists extended full of wild flowers and sweet grass. Her lovely big black eyes swam in tenderness, and seemed to plead mutely for friendship, her rosy mouth smiled sweetly, she was really a very fascinating baby girl in her white gown and cloud of dark curls, and I was feeling softened beyond description, and must inevitably have responded amiably to her advances, but, alas! something direful happened! Do you remember it, Lelia?” The beauty, flushing with resentful anger, exclaimed: “Your memory is good, and so is mine, although I never dreamed you had such a vital interest in Gipsy Darke, or I am sure I should have slapped her face harder than I did when I knocked the flowers out of her hands!” “You pulled her hair, too,” Laurie said quietly. “Yes, I pulled her hair, and I would do it again if she tried to come between our hearts as she did then--the little vixen!” she cried passionately, bitterly angered at his frank pity for Gipsy, the waif. He was half-tempted to remind her that it was she, not Gipsy, who had played the rôle of vixen in their past encounters, but he hated to see her lovely face distorted by malice, so he forbore, and taking the reins again, drove on silently out of sight of the slender figure on the cliff, outlined so clearly in the golden light--the girl watching for the coming of her fate, though she did not know it. Laurie Willoughby had spoken out too impulsively the secret thoughts that had lain dormant in his mind for years; but it was a pity that he had even betrayed them to the jealous-minded and selfish young beauty by his side. For now she would be on the alert for causes to persecute the hapless waif, whom she hated with added intensity now that Laurie had confessed to a pity and admiration for her helpless childhood. A portentous frown swept over her brow, and as though nature sympathized with the girl’s somber mood, a sudden cloud passed over the sun, and from the darkened heavens leaped a bolt of fierce blue lightning, followed by a crash of thunder long, loud, reverberating, that seemed to shake the solid earth and rive the rocks apart. Then several boulders rattled down the cliff and fell into the road before the horses’ feet, while one, rebounding from the top of the victoria, struck Lelia’s snowy temple, eliciting a shriek of terror from her blanched lips. It was one of those sudden storms that break unexpectedly on sultry days over West Virginia, and the thunder’s roll was followed by a swift downpour of rain, mixed with large hailstones, quickly cooling the overheated atmosphere.